Archive - 2013

I have treasured Your word in my heart so that I may not sin against You. Psalm 119:11

I would venture a guess that most of us that were raised in church have heard this verse – no, more than that, we probably have memorized that verse.

But how many of us as adults are putting that verse into practice? In a prayer group this month, I listened as multiple women shared that they are not having a consistent quiet time. Some even recognized that the days that they do not have a quiet time are the days that their emotions seem to run rampant and they lack patience toward their children and husband.

We all live busy lives which is why we need to prioritize our activities daily. When I know that I am facing a particularly busy day or week, I write out a schedule. You may find this to be excessive, but I find it keeps me from feeling overwhelmed. Instead of mourning that I have 15 items on my to-do list, I know that I only have three tasks to complete before noon, 4 more before 2:00 p.m. and a wrap up time by 5:00 p.m.

You better bet that I schedule breakfast, lunch, and supper every day. I don’t believe in skipping meals or even working through lunch. I believe in my meals. So why should I forsake spiritual food when I wouldn’t dream of skipping a physical meal?

For all of us who are “just too busy” out there, we need to keep a few things in mind:

• Don’t use raising children as an excuse not to have a daily quiet time. How will our children learn to make time for God if they never see us living it out?
• It’s not good enough to say, “I’ll read my Bible more this week.” Write out exactly what you will read and when.
• Create a sticker chart and purchase gold stickers if that’s what it takes. If you need help getting back in the routine of reading, praying, and memorizing Scripture, implement a reward system for you. For a month, I would pack a dessert in my lunch that I could only eat if I memorized the next couple verses in James.
• Make it a natural habit to discuss what you’ve read in Scripture with your family. Just like a book of literature can be more enjoyable with a book discussion group, the Bible will jump to life and stick in your mind better as you wrestle through passages and rejoice in God’s promises together.
• Ask God to renew your desire for His Word. But don’t just sit on the couch and wait for a lightening bolt to strike your heart. Get into the Word and keep reading.
• Lastly, don’t wait for your New Year’s Resolutions to come around to get back into the habit of reading Scripture. You can start a special study or group study January 1st, but don’t neglect the next 39 days that you could have spent time with the Lord.

Last week I had the privilege of gathering with the women in my church family to hear Mrs. Lanese Dockery discuss the importance of hospitality. She began with a simple question: What do you think of when you hear the word “hospitality?”

Food? Entertainment? Welcoming?

Mrs. Dockery said that in Greek, “hospitality” means “taking in strangers.” I don’t know about your household, but if Kevin started grabbing strangers off the street and bringing them into our household, I’d be terrified to sleep at night!

Her key emphasis was that by practicing hospitality, you are “participating in the process of changing a person’s status before God from stranger to guest.” We need to reclaim the home as the key location for ministry and reconnect the home with the church.

Bringing an unbeliever to church is a good thing, but inviting them into your home to allow them to watch how you respond to each other, the good, the bad, and all the in-between will have an even greater impact on them.

The night after participating in “hospitality night” with my sisters in Christ, Kevin and I housed one of our college friends, Peter, for the night. How did I show hospitality?

1. A place to lie his head. I pumped up the ol’ air mattress and suited it up with my Christmas penguin flannel sheets.

2. Food to eat. I grabbed a can of pumpkin and baked up some delicious holiday cupcakes.

3. Entertainment. We organized a get together at a local restaurant and invited them to our house afterwards for dessert (hence the cupcakes) and board games. We even planned brunch with a church family the next morning that wanted to catch up with Peter.

4. Comfort. I replaced the 1-ply toilet paper with 2-ply. Apparently when we moved into the house someone’s house warming gift to us was environmentally friendly toilet paper. It may be kind to the environment, but it’s a pain to me.

5. Encouragement. Meeting physical needs were easy. But meeting spiritual and emotional needs proved more of a challenge. Each of us had experienced highs and lows in the past three months and we set aside time to sit and talk about how God is moving in our lives.

Hospitality is not about proving how many material items you have, how good of a chef you are, how many plies your toilet paper boasts, or even how many spare bedrooms you keep. Hospitality is about living life together to point people to Christ. If you host a believer, they ought to leave your house encouraged in their faith; if you host an unbeliever, they ought to leave with a clearer understanding of the Gospel.

Are you using your home as a launching pad for the Gospel or as an off-limits symbol of your social status?

Before the thought burrows into your mind let me address it now – yes, this book review is a departure from the usual book reviews I write.

On my own, this would not have been my first pick in books. I tend toward classic works of fiction and spiritual development. But I enjoyed every page and already have recommended Entreleadership to several of my friends and colleagues.

Here are a few lessons from Dave Ramsey’s “play book” that he communicates in his book:

• To build a successful business, you need team members, not employees. Team members are self-motivated and share common goals whereas employees clock in and out to get the paycheck.
• Sell to people the way they want to be sold to. If your customer has a tight deadline, don’t bog them down by reading every last detail. Likewise, if your customer is extremely analytical, review the facts and don’t just skip those pages and force them to sign the final page.
• Compensate fairly and frequently. Don’t wait until a year-end review and give a standard raise. Inspire your team members and instantly reward them for a good job.
• Treat others the way you want to be treated. Give grace to team members in difficult times. When you are loyal to them, they will be loyal to you.
• Involve your spouse. Run major decisions past them. And if a spouse can’t trust your team member, neither can you.

Yes, this book’s primary audience is the owner of a business. But the secondary audience is all of us.

We are all leaders in one capacity or another. Some  may be bosses, leaders of class projects, parents, or even babysitters. Whether we have consciously considered it or not, we all have a leadership style. Many people confuse power and authority with leadership. Leadership causes you to view the people around  your differently. You set them up for success whereas a person of power only sets up themselves.

In our Christian walk, our faith is to be evident in every aspect of our lives, not just in the category of church attendance and radio stations. It is encouraging to read books by unapologetically Christian authors who clearly and concisely share their business plan.

What comes to mind when you think of rest?

Do warm and fuzzy images of your bed or favorite napping location pop into mind?

God designed our bodies for rest. In fact, rest is so important physically, spiritually, and emotionally that He modeled rest for us.

Genesis 2:2-3 says, By the seventh day God completed His work that He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work that He had done.  God blessed the seventh day and declared it holy, for on it He rested from His work of creation.

Was God tired? Did he have sleepy eyes? No, of course not.

Rest and sleep are not synonyms.

Rest involves taking time to meditate on our actions. We are to rest in God alone and take comfort in His promises.

We are not to neglect rest and become frantic or idolize rest and be lazy.

Rest has a proper place. Rests in music provide dramatic pauses and time for musicians to take a breath. Halftime at soccer matches provide athletes time to recover, strategize, and eat orange slices. What’s a song that’s only rests or a game that’s only halftime?

When was the last time you rested? Not slept. Not napped. But rested? I was told that a private school in town does the same thing at the end of every school day – they take a quiet moment to reflect on their decisions during the day. Wow! We could all take a lesson from these students. How much better would we all reflect Christ if we took several minutes during lunch to reflect on our mornings’ decisions and think ahead to our afternoons.

My nephew’s 4-D ultrasound.

My week-old nephew.

I spent last Monday in Memphis, eagerly sitting in a hospital room, happy. Happy because we made it in time. Happy because this hospital visit was to await life, not a diagnosis or death.

By supper, I was holding my hour-old nephew, his eyes wide open to this world he will live in.

Tuesday my coworker texted that she, too, had given birth that morning. I held this five-hour life, sound asleep, his long, slender fingers grasping mine with tremendous strength for one so little.

And Thursday and Friday I sat in Memphis once again, nurturing this nephew of mind, marveling at this creation in my lap. As I snuggled with him on the couch, I reflected on this week of life that the Lord had granted me and these thoughts came to mind.

• God gives breath and God takes breath away. Holding an infant is all the sweeter after walking through the valley of still-borns and miscarriages with friends. Even as we waiting during labor, we worried that complications would crop up quickly and take the doctors by surprise. 
• Adoption is an urgent issue. On Orphan Sunday (November 3rd), I learned that there are 420 children in the Madison County region that need homes and 125 that need foster parents.  As I fed, burped, and endlessly changed diapers, I found myself putting faces to adoption. There are babies in cribs right now without a mother waking to their cries. These babies become toddlers, teens, and adults who need families. God adopted us as His children, in turn, we need to find ways to support and adopt these children.
• “Miracle” is an insufficient word for a newborn. The tiny fingerprint alone is something to marvel at. Even more the way this vulnerable baby knows to take its first breath. No Accident is powerful enough to knit a life together in a mother’s womb.